Giving opinions for several years and showing like a fine vintage
Giving opinions for several years and showing like a fine vintage
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Castaway is a good film which manages to keep you watching despite there not being much interaction. Tom Hanks gives a performance which is more physical than anything. For most of the film his dialougue is limited and it's all about reaction and what he does for survival.
He plays a fed-ex employee who is obsesses with time and quite passionate about his job. He has the devoted girlfriend and a good life. One overnight flight changes that as the carrier plane he is on takes a nosedive into the ocean leaving him the only survivor. He drifts onto an island which is un-populated. The plane crash sequence is quite harrowing and certainly not advisable to watch if you have a flight in the coming weeks.
For the next hour it's pure Hanks as he tries to adapt to life stranded on the island with minimal posessions. He goes back to prehistoric methods of hunting his own food, making fire and making his own primitive clothing. He also suffers many injuries and at one point indulges in some DIY dentistry which has everyone in the audience squirming in their seats. Hanks has some interaction on the island with a ball he calls Wilson. He draws a face on the ball and through the years it's the only thing that keeps him going. Everything the ball says in in his head but he relys on it to keep him from going insane.
Eventually Hanks plans to get off the island and makes a makeshift raft. Again there isn't much to act off but it's so interesting and has some great scenes where Hanks encounters some Whales.
Of course he makes it back to civilisation and this is where the film goes downhill. We have invested so much of our time in Hanks and his mind that now we don't really get any development on how he is so alienated from society. Naturally the people who knows and loves have all moved on but he seems to take this all quite well which you find hard to believe. He never once breaks down as you'd expect. The end twenty minutes really marrs the film but this is still solid film-making and an excellent example of why Hanks is one of the best actors around. He may get an Oscar for this and it would be deserved.
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Production Year: 2002 - Action/Adventure - Director: Vincenzo Natali - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring:Lucy Liu, David Hewlett, Anne Marie Scheffler, Joseph Scoren, Matthew Sharp, Jeremy Northam
Production Year: 1964 - Action/Adventure - Director: Cyril Endfield - Original Language: English - Classification: Parental Guidance - Starring:Stanley Baker, Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, James Booth, Michael Caine, Nigel Green
Production Year: 1977 - Action/Adventure - Director: Clint Eastwood - Original Language: English - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring:Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Pat Hingle, William Prince, Bill McKinney
Action/Adventure - Original Language: English - Classification: 12 years and over - Starring:Jack Ging, Marla Heasley, Lance Legault, Melinda Culea, Mr T, Dwight Schultz, Dirk Benedict, George Peppard, Carl Franklin
Advantages: Great film, great direction, great individual performances, gripping plot Disadvantages: Slightly dodgy lighting, plot not properly explained
Cheesefather 24.01.2002 ·
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